Category: Mars

Epsom-like salts believed to be common on Mars may be a major source of water there, say geologists at Indiana University Bloomington and Los Alamos National Laboratory. In their report in this week’s Nature, the scientists also speculate that the salts will provide a chemical record of water on the Red Planet.

“The Mars Odyssey orbiter recently showed that there may be as much as 10 percent water hidden in the Martian near-surface,” said David Bish, Haydn Murray Chair of Applied Clay Mineralogy at IU and a co-author of the report. “We were able to show that under Mars-like conditions, magnesium sulfate salts can contain a great deal of water. Our findings also suggest that the kinds of sulfates we find on Mars could give us a lot of insight into the history of water and mineral formation there.”

The scientists learned that magnesium sulfate salts are extremely sensitive to changes in temperature, pressure and humidity. For that reason, the scientists argue that information contained in the salts could be easily lost if samples were brought back to Earth for study. Instead, they say, future missions to Mars should measure the properties of the salts on site.

The existence of magnesium sulfate salts on Mars was first suggested by the 1976 Viking missions and has since been confirmed by the Mars Exploration Rover as well as the Odyssey and Pathfinder missions. One way to quash remaining doubts that the salts are really there, however, would be to equip a Martian rover with an X-ray diffractometer — an instrument that analyzes the properties of crystals. Coincidentally, such a device could also be used to examine magnesium sulfate salts on Mars. Bish and collaborators from NASA Ames and Los Alamos are currently developing a miniaturized X-ray diffractometer with NASA funding.

Some magnesium sulfate salts trap more water than others. Epsomite, for example, has the most water in it — 51 percent by weight — while hexahydrite and kieserite have less (47 percent and 13 percent by weight, respectively). The proportion of water to magnesium sulfate affects the chemical properties of the different salts.

While varying temperature, pressure and humidity inside an experimental chamber, the scientists studied how the different magnesium salts transform over time.

When temperature and pressure inside an experimental chamber were lowered to Mars-like conditions (minus 64 degrees Fahrenheit, and less than 1 percent of Earth’s normal surface pressure), crystals of epsomite initially transformed into slightly less watery hexahydrite crystals and then became disorganized, but they still contained water. In contrast, “kieserite doesn’t let go of its water very easily, even at very low pressure and humidity or at elevated temperatures,” Bish said.

But when the scientists increased humidity inside the experimental chamber, they found that kieserite transformed into hexahydrite and then epsomite, which have more water.

Bish and his Los Alamos colleagues believe that the proportion and distribution of hexahydrite, kieserite and other magnesium sulfate salts on Mars may hold a record of past changes in climate and whether or not water once flowed there. However, kieserite might not be preserved through cycles of wetting and drying because of its ability to rehydrate to hexahydrite and epsomite, which can then become amorphous through drying.

Los Alamos National Laboratory geologists David Vaniman, Steve Chipera, Claire Fialips, William Carey and William Feldman also contributed to the study. It was funded by LANL Directed Research and Development Funding and NASA Mars Fundamental Research Program grants.

Original Source: Indiana University News Release

Engineers on NASA’s Mars Exploration Rover team are investigating possible causes and remedies for a problem affecting the steering on Spirit.

The relay for steering actuators on Spirit’s right-front and left-rear wheels did not operate as commanded on Oct. 1. Each of the front and rear wheels on the rover has a steering actuator, or motor, that adjusts the direction in which the wheels are headed independently from the motor that makes the wheels roll. When the actuators are not in use, electric relays are closed and the motor acts as a brake to prevent unintended changes in direction.

Engineers received results from Spirit today from a first set of diagnostic tests on the relay. “We are interpreting the data and planning additional tests,” said Rick Welch, rover mission manager at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif. “We hope to determine the best work-around if the problem does persist.”

Spirit and its twin, Opportunity, successfully completed their three-month primary missions in April and five-month mission extensions in September. They began second extensions of their missions on Oct. 1. Spirit has driven more than 3.6 kilometers (2.2 miles), six times the distance set as a goal for mission success. It is climbing into uplands called the “Columbia Hills.”

JPL’s Jim Erickson, rover project manager, said, “If we do not identify other remedies, the brakes could be released by a command to blow the fuse controlling the relay, though that would make those two brakes unavailable for the rest of the mission.” Without the steering-actuator brakes, small bumps or dips that a wheel hits during a drive might twist the wheel away from the intended drive direction.

“If we do need to disable the brakes, errors in drive direction could increase. However, the errors might be minimized by continuing to use the brakes on the left-front and right-rear wheels, by driving in smaller segments, and by adding a software patch to reset the direction periodically during a drive,” Erickson said. Engineers believe the steering-brake issue is not related to excessive friction detected during the summer in the drive motor for Spirit’s right-front wheel, because the steering actuator is a different motor.

Meanwhile, the team continues to use Spirit’s robotic arm and camera mast to study rocks and soils around the rover, without moving the vehicle until the cause of the anomaly is understood and corrective measures can be implemented.

JPL, a division of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, manages the Mars Exploration Rover project for NASA’s Science Mission Directorate, Washington. Additional information about the project is available from JPL at http://marsrovers.jpl.nasa.gov/ and from Cornell University, Ithaca, N.Y., at http://athena.cornell.edu.

Original Source: NASA/JPL News Release

This image, taken by the High Resolution Stereo Camera (HRSC) on board ESA?s Mars Express spacecraft, shows the Claritas Fossae tectonic grabens and part of the Solis Planum plains.

The image was taken during orbit 508 in June 2004 with a ground resolution of approximately 40 metres per pixel. The displayed region is the eastern part of Claritas Fossae and the western part of Solis Planum at longitude 260? East and latitude of about 28? South.

The diffuse blue-white streaks in the northern parts of the scene are clouds or aerosols.

The Claritas Fossae (?fossa? is Latin for trough) region is characterised by systems of ?grabens? running mainly north-west to south-east. These can be traced several hundred kilometres up to the northern Tharsis shield volcanoes.

A graben forms when a block of the planet?s crust drops down between two faults, due to extension, or pulling, of the crust.

Grabens are often seen together with features called ?horsts?, which are upthrown blocks lying between two steep-angled fault blocks.

A ?horst and graben? system can occur where there are several parallel faults.

Geographically, the grabens separate the eastern volcanic plains of the Solis Planum region from the western Daedalia Planum lava plains.

The lava blankets of the Solis Planum area cover the eastern parts of the older Claritas Fossae ridge and surround some of the higher ground.

The geological history of this region can be reconstructed by analysing the layers of tectonic grabens, impact craters, volcanic features and even small valley networks.

The complexity of this superposition record suggests that some of the events took place at the same time.

The detailed view of the large southern impact crater shows patches of dark material which are located near the central and marginal parts of the impact crater floor. This material may be of volcanic origin.

The HRSC experiment on ESA?s Mars Express mission is led by the Principal Investigator Prof. Gerhard Neukum of the Freie Universit?t Berlin, who also designed the camera. The experiment?s science team consists of 45 Co-Investigators from 10 nations.

The camera was developed at the German Aerospace Centre (DLR) and built in co-operation with industrial partners EADS Astrium, Lewicke Microelectronic GmbH and Jena-Optronic GmbH). The HRSC is operated by DLR Institute of Planetary Research through ESA?s European Space Operations Centre, Darmstadt.

The systematic processing of image data is carried out at DLR. The images shown here were processed by the FU Berlin group in co-operation with DLR, Berlin.

Original Source: ESA News Release

Image credit: ISECCo
Ray and some friends built Mars Base Zero a few years ago on a borrowed plot of land just outside Fairbanks, Alaska. It’s a fairly normal looking greenhouse 11 metres (36 feet) long, and two-thirds as wide. One half of the cylindrical roof is clear plastic, and the other half is well insulated. There’s also a small apartment attached to one end for Ray to live in while he tends to his Martian garden.

Inside you’ll find a healthy crop of potatoes, carrots, cabbage, tomatoes, and plenty of other produce to make a vegan smile – mostly, though, you’ll find potatoes. Through several years of experimentation, Ray has learned that a single human requires about 80 square metres (864 square feet) of soil to grow enough food to survive.

Assuming you’re willing to eat a lot of potatoes.

“We tried growing wheat, but we could have gotten several pounds of potatoes for an area that gave me just a cupful of wheat. I’m guessing that 4-5 chickens would eat the same amount as me. We might try fish, though.”

Collins is one of the original co-founders of the International Space Exploration and Colonization Co. (ISECCo); a non-profit organization hoping to contribute knowledge to the human exploration of space. Instead of building rockets in their garages, the ISECCo team decided to do something much lower budget: Closed Ecological Life Support System Research. Sort of like Biosphere II, but without all the fancy ecosystems… and drama.

They started in 1988, and built a series of experiments leading up to Mars Base Zero – a $30,000 investment. Maintaining the experiment has only cost $900 this year, since they planted the crops in May 2004. Ray figures he’s put $40,000 of his own money into the various experiments since 1988.

The only purpose of Mars Base Zero is to understand how much space is required, and which crops to grow to keep an astronaut well fed. If you could seal it up tight, and ship it to Mars, Ray figures that it would get enough sunlight on Mars to have the plants nearly growing as well as they do in Alaska.

Ray began this experiment on September 17, and he’s been keeping a detailed log of the food he’s been eating – the potatoes he’s been eating – and the, um, “waste” he’s been generating. He hasn’t lost any weight so far, but he has to eat several kilograms of food every day just to maintain. A nutritionist probably wouldn’t be too pleased with his diet so far, but Ray’s aware of the inadequacies and has new crops planned for next time around. If everything goes well, he’ll stay in for at least 30 days, and maybe as long as 60 days if the potatoes hold out. His wife is expecting to deliver their second child in December, so Ray’s got a hard deadline anyway.

Normally they plant in the spring, and then harvest in the fall. But Ray would like to try planting continuously, and keep it going as long into the winter as he can afford to pay for lights and heat. Eventually he hopes they’ll get to the point that it’s a year round operation.

And then they’ll take the experiment to the next level… underground.

ISECCo plans to build an underground dome, called Nauvik (Eskimo term for “nurturing place”), twice the same area as the greenhouse, but seal it completely off from the Earth’s environment. Water, air and other nutrients would be carefully monitored, and the plants would be grown by powerful lamps – the electricity bill alone will probably run $5,000 a month. The advantage is that they could simulate a lunar or Martian environment; even experimenting with different air pressures to see how the plants react. With the heat from the lamps, Ray expects one of the most difficult challenges will be keeping it cool.

It’ll be an expensive proposition. Especially without government or NASA funding. “We responded to a NASA request-for-proposal that was looking for unique ideas in closed system life support.” Ironically, the agency complained that their idea was “too unique”.

Maybe the astronauts weren’t willing to eat that many potatoes.

Written by Fraser Cain

NASA’s Mars Global Surveyor, starting its third mission extension this week after seven years of orbiting Mars, is using an innovative technique to capture pictures even sharper than most of the more than 170,000 it has already produced.

One dramatic example from the spacecraft’s Mars Orbiter Camera shows wheel tracks of NASA’s Mars Exploration Rover Spirit and the rover itself. Another tells scientists that no boulders bigger than about 1 to 2 meters (3 to 7 feet) are exposed in giant ripples created by a catastrophic flood.

Those examples are available online at http://www.msss.com/mars_images/moc/2004/09/27/ and http://mars.jpl.nasa.gov/mgs. In addition, about 24,000 newly catalogued images that Mars Global Surveyor took between October 2003 and March 2004 have been added to the Mars Orbiter Camera Image Gallery at http://www.msss.com/moc_gallery/. These include additional pictures of the Mars Exploration Rover sites seen from orbit.

“Over the past year and a half, the camera and spacecraft teams for Mars Global Surveyor have worked together to develop a technique that allows us to roll the entire spacecraft so that the camera can be scanned in a way that sees details at three times higher resolution than we normally get,” said Dr. Ken Edgett, staff scientist for Malin Space Science Systems, San Diego, Calif., which built and operates the Mars Orbiter Camera. The technique adjusts the rotation rate of the spacecraft to match the ground speed under the camera.

“The image motion compensation is tricky and the spacecraft does not always hit its target. However, when it does, the results can be spectacular,” Edgett said.

The Mars Orbiter Camera acquires the highest resolution images ever obtained from a Mars-orbiting spacecraft. During normal operating conditions, the smallest objects that can be resolved on the martian surface in these images are about 4 to 5 meters (13 to 16 feet) across. With the adjusted-rotation technique, called “compensated pitch and roll targeted observation,” objects as small as 1.5 meters (4.9 feet) can be seen in images from the same camera. Resolution capability of 1.4 meters (4.6 feet) per pixel is improved to one-half meter (1.6 feet) per pixel. Because the maneuvers are complex and the amount of data that can be acquired is limited, most images from the camera are still taken without using that technique.

Mars Global Surveyor began orbiting Mars on Sept. 12, 1997. After gradually adjusting the shape of its orbit, it began systematically mapping the planet in March 1999. The Mars Orbiter Camera’s narrow-angle camera has now examined nearly 4.5 percent of Mars’ surface, including extensive imaging of candidate and selected landing sites for surface missions. The Mars Orbiter Camera also includes a wide-angle camera that observes the entire planet daily.

“Mars Global Surveyor has been productive longer than any other spacecraft ever sent to Mars, since it surpassed Viking Lander 1’s longevity earlier this year and has returned more images than all past Mars missions combined,” said Tom Thorpe, project manager for Mars Global Surveyor at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif. The mission will complete its 25,000th mapping orbit on Oct. 11.

Principal goals for the orbiter’s latest mission extension, beginning Oct. 1, include continued weather monitoring to form a continuous set of observations with NASA’s next Mars mission, Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, scheduled to reach the red planet in 2006; imaging of possible landing sites for the Phoenix 2007 Mars Scout lander and 2009 Mars Science Laboratory rover; continued mapping and analysis of key sedimentary-rock outcrop sites; and continued monitoring of changes on the surface due to wind and ice. Because the narrow-angle camera has imaged only a small fraction of the surface, new discoveries about surface features are likely to come at any time. The extension runs two years, through September 2006, with a budget of $7.5 million per year.

Dr. James Garvin, NASA’s chief scientist for Mars and the Moon, said, “Mars Global Surveyor continues to catalyze new science as it explores Mars at scales compatible with those that our Mars Exploration Rovers negotiate every day, and its extended mission will continue to set the stage for upcoming observations by the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter.”

Additional information about Mars Global Surveyor is available online at: http://mars.jpl.nasa.gov/mgs/. In addition to semi-annual releases of large collections of archived pictures, the Mars Orbiter Camera team posts a new image daily and last year began soliciting public suggestions for camera targets on Mars. These materials can be viewed online at http://www.msss.com . For more information about NASA and other space science programs on the Internet, visit http://www.nasa.gov.

JPL, a division of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, manages the Mars Global Surveyor mission for NASA’s Science Mission Directorate, Washington, D.C. JPL’s industrial partner is Lockheed Martin Space Systems, Denver, which built and operates the spacecraft.

Original Source: NASA/JPL News Release

Image credit: ESA
Recent results from the ASPERA-3 instrument on board Mars Express confirm that a very efficient process is at work in the Martian atmosphere which could explain the loss of water. Water is believed to have once been abundant on the Red Planet. Professor Rickard Lundin, leader of the ASPERA-3 team, describes these findings in a paper published in the latest issue of ?Science?.

Mars is bombarded by a flood of charged particles from the Sun, commonly called the ?solar wind? and consisting of electrons and alpha particles. The solar wind erodes the atmosphere of Mars, and is believed to have stripped away a large amount of water that was present on the planet about 3.8 billion years ago. Geological evidence, as recently confirmed by images from the High Resolution Stereo Camera (HRSC) onboard Mars Express, indicates that water flows and even an ocean in the Northern hemisphere shaped the surface of Mars.

Today, water still exists on the Red Planet, but less than in the past. Observations made earlier this year by the OMEGA instrument on Mars Express showed that Mars has vast fields of perennial water ice, stretching out from its south pole.

The ASPERA-3 instrument on board Mars Express aims to answer the question of whether the solar wind interaction with the upper atmosphere of Mars contributes to the depletion of water. It is measuring a process called ?solar wind scavenging?, or the slow ?invisible? escape of volatile gases and liquid compounds which make up the atmosphere and hydrosphere of a planet. Using plasma spectrometers and a special imager to detect energetic neutral atoms, ASPERA-3 is making global and simultaneous measurements of the solar wind, the inflow of energetic particles, and also the ?planetary wind?, which is the outflow of particles from the Martian atmosphere and ionosphere.

Aspera 3 has established that the solar wind penetrates through the ionosphere and very deeply into the Martian atmosphere down to an altitude of 270 kilometres. This seems to be the reason for the acceleration processes that cause the loss of atmosphere on Mars.

Original Source: ESA News Release

As NASA’s Spirit and Opportunity rovers resumed reliable contact with Earth, after a period when Mars passed nearly behind the Sun, the space agency extended funding for an additional six months of rover operations, as long as they keep working.

Both rovers successfully completed their primary three-month missions on the surface of Mars in April and have already added about five months of bonus exploration during the first extension of their missions.

“Spirit and Opportunity appear ready to continue their remarkable adventures,” said Andrew Dantzler, solar system division director at NASA Headquarters, Washington. “We’re taking advantage of that good news by adding more support for the teamwork here on Earth that’s necessary for operating the rovers.”

Neither rover drove during a 12-day period this month, while radio transmissions were unreliable because of the Sun’s position between the two planets. Daily planning and commanding of rover activities recommenced Monday for Opportunity and today for Spirit.

“It is a relief to get past this past couple of weeks,” said Jim Erickson, project manager for both rovers at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif. “Not only were communications disrupted, but the rovers were also going through the worst part of Mars southern-hemisphere winter from a solar-energy standpoint.”

“Although Spirit and Opportunity are well past warranty, they are showing few signs of wearing out,” Erickson said. “We really don’t know how long they will keep working, whether days or months. We will do our best to continue getting the maximum possible benefit from these great national resources.”

Rover science team members will spend less time at JPL during the second mission extension. They are able to attend daily planning meetings by teleconferencing from their home institutions in several states and in Europe. “All 150 science team members and collaborators have been provided the tools to be able to participate remotely,” said JPL’s Dr. John Callas, science manager for the rover project. Workstations researchers used at JPL are at their home institutions. Planning tools include video feeds, workstation display remote viewing, and audio conferencing.

Besides reducing costs, remote operations allow scientists to spend more time at home. “We get back to more normal lives, back to our families, and we still get to explore Mars every day,” said Dr. Steve Squyres of Cornell University, Ithaca, N.Y., principal investigator.

Another change in operations is a shift from seven days per week to five days per week from October through December. This accommodates a temporary trim of about 20 percent in the project’s engineering team to about 100 members. The rovers’ reduced energy supply, during the rest of the martian winter, makes the inactive days valuable for recharging batteries. By January, the energy situation will have improved for the solar-powered rovers, provided they are still operating. The team size will rebound to support daily operations.

As Mars emerges from behind the Sun, Spirit is partway up the west spur of highlands called the “Columbia Hills,” a drive of more than 3 kilometers (2 miles) from its landing site. Opportunity is inside stadium-size “Endurance Crater,” headed toward the base of a stack of exposed rock layers in “Burns Cliff,” and a potential exit route on the crater’s south side.

JPL, a division of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, manages the Mars Exploration Rover project for NASA’s Science Mission Directorate, Washington. Images and additional information about the project are available on the Web at http://marsrovers.jpl.nasa.gov and http://athena.cornell.edu. For information about NASA programs on the Internet, visit http://www.nasa.gov.

Original Source: NASA/JPL News Release

Recent analyses of ESA?s Mars Express data reveal that concentrations of water vapour and methane in the atmosphere of Mars significantly overlap. This result, from data obtained by the Planetary Fourier Spectrometer (PFS), gives a boost to understanding of geological and atmospheric processes on Mars, and provides important new hints to evaluate the hypothesis of present life on the Red Planet.

PFS observed that, at 10-15 kilometres above the surface, water vapour is well mixed and uniform in the atmosphere. However, it found that, close to the surface, water vapour is more concentrated in three broad equatorial regions: Arabia Terra, Elysium Planum and Arcadia-Memnonia.

Here, the concentration is two to three times higher than in other regions observed. These areas of water vapour concentration also correspond to the areas where NASA?s Odyssey spacecraft has observed a water ice layer a few tens of centimetres below the surface, as Dr Vittorio Formisano, PFS principal investigator, reports.

New in-depth analysis of PFS data also confirms that methane is not uniform in the atmosphere, but concentrated in some areas. The PFS team observed that the areas of highest concentration of methane overlap with the areas where water vapour and underground water ice are also concentrated. This spatial correlation between water vapour and methane seems to point to a common underground source.

Initial speculation has taken the underground ice layer into account. This could be explained by the ?ice table? concept, in which geothermal heat from below the surface makes water and other material move towards the surface. It would then freeze before getting there, due to the very low surface temperature (many tens of degrees Celsius below zero).

Further investigations are needed to fully understand the correlation between the ice table and the presence and distribution of water vapour and methane in the atmosphere.

In other words, can the geothermal processes which ?feed? the ice table also bring water vapour and other gases, like methane, to the surface? Can there be liquid water below the ice table? Can forms of bacterial life exist in the water below the ice table, producing methane and other gases and releasing them to the surface and then to the atmosphere?

The PFS instrument has also detected traces of other gases in the Martian atmosphere. A report on these is currently under peer review. Further studies will address whether these gases can be linked to water and methane and help answer the unresolved questions. In-situ observations by future lander missions to Mars may provide a more exhaustive solution to the puzzle.

Original Source: ESA News Release

This image, taken by the High Resolution Stereo Camera (HRSC) on board ESA?s Mars Express spacecraft, shows part of a heavily eroded impact crater at Solis Planum, in the Thaumasia region of Mars.

The image was taken during orbit 431 in May 2004 with a ground resolution of approximately 48 metres per pixel. The displayed region is located south of Solis Planum at longitude 271? East and latitude of about 33? South.

The larger eroded impact crater in the lower left of the image has a diameter of about 53 kilometres and its eastern crater rim is about 800 metres high.

The blue/white tint in the eastern (top left) part of the scene indicates a near-surface haze or clouds.

To the south (right), tectonic ?graben? structures can be seen running in three different directions (north-west, north-east and east-north-east), which show three different phases of development.

A graben is a down-dropped block of the crust resulting from extension, or pulling, of the crust. They are often seen together with features called ?horsts?, which are upthrown blocks lying between two steep-angled fault blocks. Some of the graben shown here are about five kilometres wide.

The northern end of the higher region, or upper left in this image, contains an almost circular plateau, which is 15 kilometres across.

It may be an old impact crater, filled by sediments, which developed a harder consistency than the surrounding material over the course of time.

Later, the more easily eroded material was removed and the harder inner filling remained. This phenomenon is called ?inverted relief?.

Original Source: ESA News Release

Spacecraft observations of the landing area for one of NASA’s two Mars rovers now indicate there likely was an enormous sea or lake covering the region in the past, according to a new University of Colorado at Boulder study.

Research Associate Brian Hynek of the Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space Physics said data from the Mars Global Surveyor and Mars Odyssey spacecraft now show that the region surrounding the Opportunity rover’s landing site probably had a body of water at least 330,000 square kilometers, or 127,000 square miles. That would make the ancient sea larger in surface area than all the Great Lakes combined, or comparable to Europe’s Baltic Sea.

In March, Opportunity instruments scanning the Meridiani Planum landing region confirmed that rock outcrops there, rich in the iron oxide mineral hematite, also contained the types of sulfate that only could have been created by interactions of water with Martian rock. Hynek used thermal emission data and camera images from the orbiting spacecraft to show such bedrock outcrops extend outward for many miles north, east and west.

“If the outcrops are a result of sea deposition, the amount of water once present must have been comparable to the Baltic Sea or all of the Great Lakes combined,” he said. Hynek speculated that future studies may show that the ancient sea was even larger.

A paper on the subject by Hynek appears in the Sept. 9 issue of Nature.

The thermal emission imaging system, or THEMIS, aboard Mars Odyssey is used to infer the particle size of rocks near or on the surface of Mars, he said.

High thermal inertia measurements indicate a prevalence of larger chunks of rock, which heat up more slowly in daylight and cool more slowly in evenings. Low thermal inertia measurements are from fine-grained particles that heat and cool more quickly.

The thermal maps of Mars developed by Hynek indicate the rocky outcrops associated with ancient water extend far outside the boundaries of the landing area. “The thermal inertia for this area is relatively high, an indication the region contains substantial bedrock,” he said.

Hynek speculated that if the outcrops at the landing site are the result of sea deposition, as believed, the body of water must have been deep enough and persisted long enough to build up sediments roughly one-third of a mile deep. “For this to occur, the ancient global climate of Mars must have been different from its present climate and have lasted for an extended period,” Hynek wrote in the Nature paper.

“I believe new findings showing evidence of large amounts of water on Mars over long periods of time could increase the science potential for those seeking evidence of past or present life on Mars,” said Hynek.

Hematite deposits on Earth come primarily from the presence of long-standing water or groundwater systems, Hynek said. Many scientists believe the requirement for primitive life forms, at least on Earth, include water or some other liquid, a source of energy and access to elements to construct complex molecules.

“It is important to understand how extensive these water-rich environments were and how long they persisted, because life required at least some degree of environmental stability in order to begin and to evolve,” said NASA-Ames Research Center astrobiologist David Des Marais regarding Hynek’s study.

“Orbital observations and future landed missions will provide crucial details about the long-term legacy of liquid water on Mars, and whether life ever became a part of that legacy,” said Des Marais, a member of the Mars rover science team.

CU-Boulder doctoral student Nathaniel Putzig and LASP Research Associate Michael Mellon assisted in the data processing for the remote sensing images used in the Nature study.

The Mars rover, Spirit, landed in the Gusev Crater on Jan. 4. Opportunity, its twin, landed on the Meridiani Planum on the opposite side of the planet Jan. 25. Both rovers still are under operation by NASA and returning science data.

Original Source: CU Boulder News Release